Hooks For Artificial Lures

Without a well-designed hook to ensure good hook-up rate, even a lure that is proven to draw attacks from fishes might not be productive. In this article, let us take a look at some of the commonly seen hooks available for lures and what are the pros and cons each type has to offer.

- Isaac Tang

The final part of this hook series details the pros and cons of inline singles, double hooks and special hooks for soft baits.

Inline Singles – Pros and Cons

The Inline Single hook, as the name rightly suggests, is a single hook with the ring in the same plane as the movement of the lure. It is specially designed for lures and were first made popular by trout anglers. This is because the lures used for trout fishing are usually small (no more than 50mm)and have very delicate swimming actions. Having trebles small enough to match and balance these tiny lures is often challenging, as the hooks will have to be extremely fine wired,and will usually open quickly when encountering a good sized trout.

In Southeast Asia, where trout is hardly present (except for some close relatives of the trout living in secluded mountain streams), inline singles are getting popular for other reasons listed below:

• Hook strength vs weight - To achieve the same balance on the same lure, the angler can opt for thicker inline singles as a treble is almost three times the weight of a single hook of similar size. This of course results in better strength and anglers can set higher drags and not worry about straightening the hooks.

• Hook size - Inline Single hooks are less likely to interlock and slightly bigger hooks can be used, hence making up for the hooking up rate.

• More economical - Inline singles are definitely easier on your wallet when compared to trebles, especially when you have a lot of lures that need fresh hooks.